Clif Bar drops sponsored athletes for free-soloing?

NoRoCo wrote:

every thread has been slammed hard on their facebook page lol

Internet, aka nothing-is-ever-forgotten place

I feel like I must be missing something here.

Clif Bar is a FOR PROFIT company. They give climbers money for the purpose of making more money for the company. If at some point they feel like they feel like those climbers are not going to make them more money (for whatever reason), they stop giving them money. I could speculate on their reasoning (brand positioning, whatever) but in the end I'm guessing it all boils down to "we will make more money this way."

I don't see what's wrong with that. It's a business, not a charity.

Personally I've always thought giving people a financial incentive to solo was kind of morally questionable anyway.

This conversation is dumb. I'm gonna go watch a dude get eaten by an anaconda.

jon weekley wrote:This conversation is dumb. I'm gonna go watch a dude get eaten by an anaconda.

+1

Of course, if I have difficulties redpointing my "finding youtube video of a dude getting eaten by anaconda" project, I can always change air in my spare tire

"In general, an opinion is a judgment, viewpoint, or statement about matters commonly considered to be subjective, i.e. based on that which is less than absolutely certain, and is the result of emotion or interpretation of facts. What distinguishes fact from opinion is that facts are verifiable, i.e. can be objectively proven to have occurred."

Somebody already mentioned this, but the only fact in this story that I am curious about is whether this sponsorship of soloists was brought up when the company's general and d&o liability insurance policy came up for renewal.

I'm guessing they will never reveal that anyway, and I have no problem with continuing to use Cliff products regardless.

All climbers Free-Solo.... its part of the game.

I don't like these big productions, filming climbers free solo.

Cliff Bar made a business decision.

Thats their right.

M Sprague wrote:
I thought Clif Bar's explanation was thoughtful and made sense. It is pretty much how I would feel in the situation. You are free to solo and what not; it is a very personal decision, but I am uncomfortable encouraging it by adding an unnatural financial incentive. ...

wfscot wrote: Agreed 100%. I can only imagine some young kid hoping to make it in climbing, looking at Alex Honnold, and feeling they had to free solo in order to make the big bucks. That sucks a bit and any sponsor should realize that they play a big part in that perception. If a sponsor is ok with that, I fully respect that decision. Likewise, if they, like Clif, decide not to encourage that behavior, I respect that as well.

Some calm wisdom in both comments; it's needed here. Add to wfscot's young kid the complete beginner who comes to think that "climbing" necessarily involves the extremes some of which have little or anything to do with climbing. (And that some MP members can quote Clif Bar's declaration of commitment to trad, bouldering, alpinism and sport climbing as if they named only bouldering and sport leaves me near speechless.) For beginners to learn the basics and move on up, all four activities have plenty of great inspiring achievers, from the mentor in a local climbing group or gym to sponsored climbers. Beginners don't need wild expectations [yet].

Now if one of the folk Clif rejected would say they respect what Clif has done, however much they regret it, and will continue to eat Clif bars, assuming one or two ever did, then I'll think common sense and good ethical thinking is coming through on all sides.

Christian wrote:"In general, an opinion is a judgment, viewpoint, or statement about matters commonly considered to be subjective, i.e. based on that which is less than absolutely certain, and is the result of emotion or interpretation of facts. What distinguishes fact from opinion is that facts are verifiable, i.e. can be objectively proven to have occurred." Somebody already mentioned this, but the only fact in this story that I am curious about is whether this sponsorship of soloists was brought up when the company's general and d&o liability insurance policy came up for renewal. I'm guessing they will never reveal that anyway, and I have no problem with continuing to use Cliff products regardless.

The fact is that they dropped their high risk athletes.
Then someone had the opinion that it was because of liability.

One day this Gummybear drink company handed out t-shirts to anyone who set their hair on fire and made lots of money on the publicity. Then a whole bandwagon of companies followed suit. Finally one granola patty cake company decides they no longer want to hand out their shirts to these daredevils and a great many followers want to burn the company.

Ryan Watts wrote:I feel like I must be missing something here. Clif Bar is a FOR PROFIT company. They give climbers money for the purpose of making more money for the company. If at some point they feel like they feel like those climbers are not going to make them more money (for whatever reason), they stop giving them money. I could speculate on their reasoning (brand positioning, whatever) but in the end I'm guessing it all boils down to "we will make more money this way." I don't see what's wrong with that. It's a business, not a charity. Personally I've always thought giving people a financial incentive to solo was kind of morally questionable anyway.

They are a great marketing team, I mean they are no longer paying the free soloist but are likely to get TONS of media profit just like this forum for a long time. Profiting off a free soloist without even having to pay them anything for a while. Once all the free media they are getting off them dies down they can say they changed their mind and get a ton more media.

The goal of a marketing team is to spend as little money as possible to get the most people talking about them as possible. Very rarely does negative feedback get bad enough to have a negative over positive impact on a company.

Recently written laws--->more power to insurance companies---->strong arming after seeing a film that accurately describes those that stand apart from the norm??? Is Clif truly to blame?

ViperScale wrote: Very rarely does negative feedback get bad enough to have a negative over positive impact on a company.

How many people in here said they plan to buy Clif Bars after reading the story? Because I saw about 100 posts on Facebook of people saying they will never buy their product again, but zero saying they plan to buy the product in lue of the press.

Let's face it, climbers make up a small portion of Clif Bar's customer base. As is evident in their statement, the company has recognized this fact and is obviously directing marketing towards a larger spectrum of people. Power Bar did a similar thing in the late 90s and it worked well for them. It is not uncommon for a business to re-evaluate their customer base and shift advertising accordingly (sponsorships are just a form of advertising). Vocal though we may be, climbers boycotting Clif Bar will most likely have zero influence on the company. Let it be, the food (if that's what we are calling it) is terrible anyways.

I wonder how they feel about sponsored climbers on runouut slabs, or 100ft bolt spacing on a 5.2 pitch thats part of a 24p .10c climb Does their sponsored 5.13 climber need to rope up for 5.8-5.9 entry pitches to harder sections? I'd like to see what the actual contract changes are for the climbers.

Just thinking of long routes like things up at Darrington, WA or wasting time being roped up and belaying on the first 11p of infinite bliss.

20 kN wrote: How many people in here said they plan to buy Clif Bars after reading the story? Because I saw about 100 posts on Facebook of people saying they will never buy their product again, but zero saying they plan to buy the product in lue of the press.

Yea but i also posted on here i would never eat one again... but you know what? I wasn't eating them before this happened either. Most of those people posting that probably never ate them to begin with.

Tronald Dump wrote:I wonder how they feel about sponsored climbers on runouut slabs, or 100ft bolt spacing on a 5.2 pitch thats part of a 24p .10c climb Does their sponsored 5.13 climber need to rope up for 5.8-5.9 entry pitches to harder sections? I'd like to see what the actual contract changes are for the climbers. Just thinking of long routes like things up at Darrington, WA or wasting time being roped up and belaying on the first 11p of infinite bliss.

I am far from an amazing climber but i have done multi routes with 50-80ft runouts between bolts / protection with possible ground falls. I don't like doing it but once in a while you get into that spot where you really don't have a huge option unless you bail and most of us don't like to bail. (once in a while those types of routes do have option to go off route onto protection and than back on route afterwards but not all)

NYT article

nytimes.com/2014/11/16/spor…

Bill M wrote:Sounds like I am in the minority, but I have always thought that commercially promoting soloing was wrong. This does not mean I think people should not solo – it is a person’s right to live their life as they see fit. However, having business executives in suits – Clif Bar is a $500M company - making money of people who are risking their life, seems - well – wrong. A fellow taking about a recent death in an X Games event summed it up pretty well, "Sport was conceived as a means to improve body health and quality of life," Brookens said. "As currently practiced, the X Games appear designed to - for the competitors - maximize the potential risk and injury. Certainly the same athletic skills can be developed and displayed with less potential for harm, even permanent, to the athletes without sacrificing enjoyment for the spectator. In reality, this is all about risk, not about performance.” denverpost.com/ci_22495062/…

If I were deciding whether to sponsor an athlete engaged in an activity such as free-soloing which has a zero margin of error I would consider a couple of ethical questions:

1. What is my intention? Would I be sponsoring the athlete because I can profit from the attention they garner for risky behavior, or would I be sponsoring the athlete because I hope to encourage a high level of athletic performance?

2. What is the consequence? Even if I intend to support high performance rather than riskiness, will the athlete feel encouraged to be excessively risky because that's what ultimately gets the most attention and sponsorship dollars?

The challenge with assessing whether to sponsor free solo climbers is that riskiness and performance are confounded. Miraculous speed records on Half Dome and other big walls would not be possible with any existing safety system. Here's a simple hypothetical we could consider in trying to answer the above questions: If these athletes used a magical safety system that eliminated all risk and did not hinder performance would I still sponsor them because of their abilities and accomplishments?

Many non-professional climbers free solo or put themselves in situations with zero margin for error. You can go to the Flatirons almost any day of the week to witness this. These climbers are free soloing within their comfort zone, but the consequences could be the same as falling from a free solo of Half Dome. The comfort zone for high performance athletes exists at a much higher difficulty than most of us can even achieve with a proper safety system. There isn't any metric for risk level and it's going to vary for each person because it depends on ability level almost as much as the situation (i.e. grade and exposure). Perhaps when deciding whether to sponsor an athlete in a risk inherent sport such as climbing, companies should consider an ethical check like the one above rather than only considering risk level because risk is always present and it's very subjective.

I'm curious, do sport climbers get dropped for climbing trad and visa versa? Let's say a boulderer really wants to do trad and sucks at it but still wants to do it cos he or she likes it a lot and continues to suck. What happens? His ratings drop? He no longer is desired by a label?
Or a sport climbing chick wants to do ice, gets her face cut by a pic. Does she get dumped cos no longer cute?

From the NYT article:

Speaking of Clif Bar, Potter said: “It’s understandable if they say, ‘We shouldn’t have supported the film and we’re not aligned with you guys.’ I would have understood, and said, ‘Yeah, I know we’re pretty out there.’ But what they did was a filthy business move. They still support the film, but not the athletes? It seemed sleazy that Clif Bar would use some of my best climbs, and Alex’s best climbs, as a marketing tool on one hand, but then fire us on the other.”